


End-Of-Year Secret Police WIP Amnesty Showcase

by ErinPtah



Series: Republic of Heaven Community Radio [8]
Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Alternate Universe - Gems, Alternate Universe - Hunger Games Setting, Daemon Separation, F/F, Feeding Kink, M/M, Suicidal Thoughts, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-25
Updated: 2015-12-31
Packaged: 2018-05-09 07:33:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 5,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5531141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ErinPtah/pseuds/ErinPtah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As a holiday gift, the Sheriff has extended limited amnesty to people who post fanfiction they never intend to finish.</p><p>So here's a collection of scenes, snippets, and other unfinished pieces of writing, from Works No Longer In Progress.</p><p>Chapters that come from specific AUs:<br/>1 - Hunger Games AU<br/>5 - Republic of Heaven Community Radio<br/>6 - Gem Vale</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Megan in the Hunger Games AU (G)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Scenes from a planned side story in [the Hunger Games AU](http://archiveofourown.org/series/82837), focusing on Megan Wallaby. (She's the one-handed trans technological child prodigy from District Three, reaped as a boy during the same games as Tamika.)

Tak and Herschel Wallaby still love to tell the story of how their firstborn child hacked the television at age four.

"We always thought she might be gifted," Herschel will say. (They both use "she" now, no matter who they're talking to.) "But we didn't want to let parental pride get the best of us when she might only be doing things by rote, you know? Anyway, I was rewiring a secondhand microwave in the office — I still remember the model — while Tak was sweeping up in the kitchen, when the TV comes on."

"No big deal, right?" Tak will add. "Of course we had all the usual controls, blocking anything violent, anything sexual, plus most of the Capitol programming — especially during Games week. So imagine our surprise when all of a sudden we hear Cecil Palmer's voice coming from the living room."

"We both dropped everything. I still don't know why. He announces so many things, any one of them could've been in reruns. But no, the holo was playing the opening ceremonies — and there was our baby sitting next to the projector, with its back popped off and wires sticking out every which way, totally enthralled."

"We end up letting her watch until the procession is over. Easier than trying to explain why 'parade day' isn't a good thing." Tak always gets a little wistful at this point. "At the end, she turns to me and says, _Daddy, can I get a sparkly dress like the girl from Five had?_ "

And Herschel will sigh. "There was so much about her we didn't know."

 

***

 

Megan was six and a half when second grade began, which means she must have been about six-and-three-quarters the day she sat next to Janice Carlsberg in art class and said, "How come you can't walk?"

"Because my legs don't work," said Janice. "Do you have a green crayon? I need green."

"No. And I mean, how come you _still_ can't walk? You're rich. You could visit the Capitol and have them make your legs work if you wanted."

Most people from Three never even got to visit the Capitol, but Janice's stepdad was one of their Victors, so as far as Megan could tell that meant he got to go anywhere he wanted. And obviously nothing was beyond the reach of the doctors in the big city. They could make you see in the dark, or give you a tail like a tiger. They could make your body heal the worst scars, or totally change its shape if you were born with the wrong one. If you had a limb that was totally missing, they could grow you a whole new one from scratch! Megan's parents couldn't even afford a cheap claw to put over the stump of her left forearm.

It would be a while before she understood that bodies were slipperier things than machines, and couldn't necessarily be made to do whatever you want if you just attached the right circuits and programmed the right code.

"Daddy says the Capitol destroys everything it touches," said Janice matter-of-factly. "Do you have blue? I have yellow, so I could just mix that with the blue if you had blue."

"Okay." Megan handed her the crayon in question.

"I don't understand why yellow and blue don't make green on the computer," added Janice. "They should just make it work like crayons do. It would be easier."

"It's because the values on the computer describe the amounts of light output by the pixels in the LCD screen," said Megan. Wasn't that obvious?


	2. Feeding kink scenelet (M)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Random kink scenelet with Cecil and Carlos: feeding/stuffing, D/s elements, in-scene complaining.
> 
> [Insert usual lament about "in an AU where we can count on Carlos to respect negotiated boundaries, and to notice if Cecil shows obvious signs of distress, and then, y'know, respond."]

The scene: Cecil, starting to get excited as soon as Carlos texts to say "don't snack this afternoon...I'm cooking." Carlos, taking over the whole kitchen to make a mix of sweet & savory tidbits, all scientifically optimized for hand-feeding. Curled up on the couch together, Cecil not allowed to move or reach for things himself, just taking everything Carlos puts in his mouth. Lots of finger-licking.

Breaking early for a blowjob, while Cecil is still nimble enough to give one. Carlos making sure to tell him how good he looks with his mouth full. Back to the hand-feeding. Cecil sure isn't hungry any more, but he's not going to stop until he's tried a little of everything, is he? Of course not. Carlos has put a lot of effort into taking care of him, here, and Cecil is going to appreciate every bit of it.

Full, heavy, drowsy Cecil being allowed to lie down with his head in Carlos's lap. Moaning about how bloated he feels and how he can't even move. Carlos gets so hot and bothered listening to that.

But Carlos doesn't let him stop, and Cecil keeps eating from Carlos's fingers, until he finally gets rewarded with a slow, leisurely handjob. Lapping the come off Carlos's hand afterward. And surely he can take it if Carlos feeds him one last deviled egg, or a cannoli, or a few more stuffed olives? (He can.)

Cecil really is too stuffed to move by now. Carlos has a washcloth on standby to wipe off his mouth, then gives him a gentle belly rub to settle his stomach. He's overeaten so much, Carlos can feel the extra swelling of Cecil's torso under his hands. Cecil falls asleep right there, sated and sexed-out and all drowsy from the tryptophan. Carlos keeps touching him for a while afterward, savoring every moment of it.

(...and then belatedly realizes he hasn't eaten anything yet tonight. Quietly polishing off some of the uneaten snacks, all while cuddling his well-fed Cecil.)


	3. Trish Hidge/Pamela Winchell flailing (T)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A stream of disorganized prompting, headcanons, and general flail about my favorite tiny pairing.

It's criminal how little attention Trish Hidge and Pamela Winchell have gotten! Especially when there are fans willing to come up with so many elaborate ideas and fics about characters who are literally only mentioned in one or two lines in canon. So here, have a bunch of my thoughts on the characters, and hopefully it'll kickstart some other people's imaginations.

Trish is defensive of the former Mayor, looks up to her, respects her, and tries to emulate her in various ways (although her skills aren't nearly as polished as Winchell's are). Could just be that Trish respects the office -- we haven't heard from her since Mayor Cardinal was elected -- but obviously the more fun option is that she's devoted to Winchell personally. Loyalty kink! Mentor-and-devoted-subordinate dynamics! Imagine Winchell acting exasperated when it always takes Trish five minutes to finish turning into a horse, but not-so-secretly thinking it's adorable.

And yeah, it's canon (if you take Trish at her word, at least) that they can both turn into horses. And fly. And turn invisible. Think of the possibilities. Sex in midair! Turning invisible to have schmoopy romantic moments without worrying that Leann Hart will have photos on the front page tomorrow morning! Imagine Winchell being in a really boring meeting, until an invisible Trish sneaks in and starts whispering sweet nothings in her ear. Alternately, Trish goes all-out and starts doing a striptease. Winchell can't see it any more than the rest of the room can, but the difference is that Winchell knows it's happening. Any time she seems more eager than usual to get away from the council, it means an invisible Trish is going to get tackled in the nearest bathroom within two minutes of the close of the session.

It's also canon that Winchell grows different kinds of moss -- possibly for some esoteric Night Vale purpose, possibly just as a hobby. Imagine how excited Trish was, assuming she was being offered a really weird come-on, the first time Winchell suggested "come over to my place and let me show you how to stimulate my moss patch."

My mental image of Winchell looks amazing in expensive tailored pantsuits, and wears a lot of classy bloodstone jewelry. That said, she looks impressive in anything, clay-stained smocks included. Attitude is everything. Trish wears cheaper imitations of the same outfits, and is a lot more excitable, but she's constantly getting better at carrying herself in that striking way.

(The only definite appearance info we have on either one is that Winchell has olive skin. The way I draw them, Winchell looks like she could be Eleanor Holmes Norton's younger sister -- same skin and hair tones, same imposing sense of presence. Trish, meanwhile, is like a bootleg version of Huma Abedin: way more excitable and less poised, but looks remarkably glamorous when she's holding still and not talking.)

One of Winchell's long and possibly-metaphorical speeches referred to the Mayor as having six arms. If she was, in fact, being literal...just imagine her using all six hands to reduce Trish to a wonderfully overstimulated puddle of sensation. (Also possibly literal. I want lots of weird!sex fic here, beyond the fandom standards like tentacles, is what I'm saying.)

Then imagine Trish's reaction to the recent election. Imagine her putting her well-exercised denial skills into practice harder than she ever has before. Imagine her ultimately being even more upset about it than Winchell is, and being the one who needs to be the recipient of comfort sex.

...Imagine Trish being furiously angry with Mayor Cardinal's existence for months afterward, until Winchell is all "you know, you're going to need to come around and respect the new holder of the office eventually." And, long story short, it gets solved with a reconciliatory threesome.

tl;dr TRISH HIDGE/PAMELA WINCHELL. Get on this, fandom.


	4. Carlos, Khoshekh, and occupied NVCR (G)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A scene written for [Night Vale: The Musical](http://archiveofourown.org/series/152909), although I've completely forgotten what the point was supposed to be. Carlos visits the NVCR building during the Strexcorp occupation, while Kevin is sitting in for Cecil.

It took half a dozen tries before the station doors would let Carlos in. Darn reclaimed bloodstones, thinking they knew what was best for everyone. They kept opening on mysterious non-station landscapes, like the zoo or a nice relaxing sauna or a vast empty desert with a mountain in the distance, until Carlos explained very patiently that he knew it was dangerous, but he needed to go inside for professional reasons, and he would keep his guard up and try not to get killed.

With the distinct sound of a groan, the doors opened on the familiar NVCR lobby.

Carlos wheeled in his equipment, to-do list safely in his pocket and latex gloves already on his hands. He signed in — choosing to take a temporary visitor badge rather than a "permanent visitor implant" — and carried everything up to the floor where the booth was located...then stopped in the men's room, because Cecil had asked him to say hi to Khoshekh and the kittens.

The floating, spiny, intermittently-poisonous probably-not-felines were all hovering in their usual spaces. And an intern was there too, spooning wet food into the various floating bowls: a young woman with red-orange curls and square glasses who looked strangely familiar. ("Strangely" because Carlos had first seen her at the station...and that had been weeks ago.)

"Intern Maureen? You're still here?"

"Shhh!" hissed Maureen. "Don't jinx it! This internship was dangerous enough already before the Eyeless Wonder showed up."

"Sorry," said Carlos to the intern.

"Cecil says hello," said Carlos to Khoshekh and the kittens.

"Achoo," said Carlos to no one in particular.

Carlos had always gotten bad physical reactions when he hung around Khoshekh for too long. First sneezing. Then itching. Then, if he hadn't done the sensible thing and fled the area yet, raised purple patterns developing on his skin in the shapes of dark swirls, elder signs, and the occasional eyeball. "Did you not know you were allergic to cats?" asked Cecil sympathetically. "I'll pick up some Claritin for you on the way home."


	5. Separation ordeals in the daemon AU (G)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some scenes written for [Republic of Heaven Community Radio](http://ptahrrific.dreamwidth.org/205307.html#contents). I was thinking of doing a mostly-flashback story that covered the time of Cecil's childhood experience of daemon separation, then Emmanuel's, and finally worked up to Kevin's.
> 
> Instead all of that ended up being addressed in [Let The Shadows Fall Behind You](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4340636/chapters/9844451), a flash-forward that covers the time of Janice's separation, and focuses on Cecil making some long-delayed recovery from his own.

Cecil and Khoshekh stay at the hospital through dinner, picking at their takeout noodles. Carlos, whose post-surgery diet has been upgraded to jello and protein shakes, diligently swallows everything he's been given before reaching for his boyfriend's hand. "Cecil. He needs his daemon."

Cecil doesn't answer.

"He could _get_ his daemon." It happened to Will Parry, whose Kirjava was internal until he went through a separation ordeal. "The witches would probably tolerate it. Serafina Pekkala would back you up, I think, if you asked. And he needs...he deserves...."

"I _know_ ," says Cecil miserably. His chair creaks as if he's sinking lower into it. "I could see her. She was so sad, Carlos. She needs to be held so badly."

If Carlos had working eyes, he'd be staring. "You can see internal daemons?"

"Not automatically. You have to relax into a certain frame of mind, focus in a certain way — half-close your eyes, if you see through your eyes — I think anyone with vision could learn it. I don't remember when I did, or why, but it came back very easily, when I thought to try it." Cecil swallows. "His daemon isn't autonomous right now, obviously. They have the same consciousness. It's like seeing a shadow. She moves when he moves, trails after him, reflects the things he feels."

"Oh, wow," says Carlos softly. "Does that mean she was human-shaped...?" (Isaña shivers at the creepy idea and leans against his side.)

Cecil's hand twitches in his. "Canine. She's an African painted dog...did you know, they're one of the few predators where the adults let the little ones eat first? And if one of the adults is hurt and can't hunt, the others will bring it food. And all of them will take care of the puppies, even the ones that aren't parents."

Every word of this is clawing Carlos right in the heart. "Can you tell him tonight? I don't have another walk in me right now, and they probably wouldn't let me in after hours anyway, but you're the Voice, you have some pull. Unless you want to ask some witch authority for permission first...either way, can you get started now? I'll be fine on my own." He twists his free hand in the bedsheets, fighting the instinct to scratch at his stitches, which wouldn't exactly help his case. "And he should know as soon —"

"It's not that easy!"

"What?"

"The ordeal," clarifies Cecil. "You're talking about it like it's some kind of routine spell, or a simple test, or a common everyday duel. It's not like that. It kills people! And even if it doesn't, it might make you wish — it _hurts_ , Carlos...."

 

__~/*\~__

 

Twelve-year-old Emmanuel Palmero is doing his Modified Sumerian homework in the living room when the screen door bangs open. He can hear Aunt Josie snapping something from the back porch, and there's the unmistakable _whoosh_ of air that means Bekhorei has landed nearby, sail-sized wings folding closed.

He flips to the next page, stylus poised over the tablet where he's been etching the answers. Ugh, more conjugations....

Josie's falcon daemon soars into the room and flaps to a landing on the back of the couch. "Go to your room, Manny."

"What? How come?"

"Don't argue. Get your homework and go."

Emmanuel scoops up the textbook and his stylus, points his feet toward the hall, starts walking...then spins on his heel and ducks toward the kitchen door. He doesn't have his range yet, but with Neharah insubstantial, Ojansi can't drag him back by the daemon.

He gets a glimpse of Mom, of the stroller even Cecil no longer fits in, of what must be Cecil's feet hanging awkwardly over the edge. Then Aunt Josie herself gets between them, moving unfairly fast for someone who walks with a limp, and swings her cane so fast it clips Emmanuel upside the head. "What did I say, child? You can help most by staying out of the way."

Is something wrong? Is Cecil sick? "Why didn't they just _say_ so," mutters Manny, trudging off to his room with his daemon perched lacewing-formed on his shoulder. His brother is a pain and a tagalong and an insufferable brat, but that doesn't mean Emmanuel would ever do anything to _hurt_ him.

A half hour later, Ojansi lets himself into Manny's room, carrying a duffel bag in his claws. "You're staying with me for a few days. Pack some clothes."

He packs. But he's not happy about it. Mom has a bigger TV than Aunt Josie does, and also Josie has a habit of calling him these girly endearments, which seems like a mean way of teasing. He can't help that he was born with a hormone imbalance. When he started taking shots for it last year he thought she might lay off, but she didn't.

"Is Cecil contagious?" he asks as Josie herds him out the front door.

"Not in the way you think," mutters Josie.

Neharah says what Emmanuel is afraid to voice: "Is he okay?"

Mom and Cecil can see Emmanuel's daemon all the time, easy, but Josie has to squint and look for them. "Your brother is a strong, brave, hardy little boy," she says, which isn't exactly an answer. "And your mother would never do anything that she knew he wouldn't recover from."

That doesn't make Manny feel better. People can recover from a _lot_.

 

__~/*\~__

 

Señora Harlan starts bringing Earl over after school. At first Cecil doesn't have the energy to do much more than sit up and watch cartoons, so Emmanuel uses a notice-me-not spell to sneak into the library and check out lots of video tapes. Kiddie fare like _Looney Tunes_ and _Don't Hug Me I'm Scared_ , and more sophisticated works like _Candle Cove_ and _My Little Pony_.

( _Obviously_ Glory is the best pony. Earl is under the mistaken impression that Moondancer is the best, and Cecil has a childish fascination with Slenderpony, but they'll understand when they're older.)


	6. Night Vale Gems AU snippet (T)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [Night Vale Gems AU](http://erinptah.deviantart.com/gallery/55387042/The-Night-Vale-Gems): why Moonstone (Cecil) and [Carlosruizite](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlosruizite) have never fused.
> 
> Heads-up for canon-typical depression.

As their dating life started getting more serious, Moonstone wanted to. But Carlosruizite always had something very scientific to work on, or promised to show up but couldn't make it, and they didn't get around to it.

Moonstone tried to talk himself out of worrying about it, to cast it as a healthy and positive thing. "We are not one person. How lonely that would be! A couple who has made themselves one so completely, that they are once again alone."

Even though, for Gems, fusion _isn't_ unhealthy or loneliness-inducing. A healthy one involves connection, communication, and togetherness. (Which parallels how, for humans, "telling your partner basic facts about your career situation" is healthy communication. What's not so healthy is telling them "you need to put up with the consistent unhappiness of this LDR because it's a good thing for my career...and you might start second-guessing this logic if you knew I haven't actually talked to my employers for years, but, conveniently, I've never brought that up.")

Anyway.

Then Moonstone got imprisoned by Strexcorp, and Carlosruizite went MIA. Even when Moonstone was rescued, and spent a little time hiding out in the otherworld desert with the Giant Army, Carlosruizite hadn't made it there yet. Moonstone never asked what he was doing, or why it took him so long.

The events of the next year combined to push Moonstone into a deep depression. His gem projection was poofed several times; every regeneration got sloppier and less coordinated as he put less effort into it. The more adrift and disconnected he felt, the harder it was for him to sustain a fusion with anybody, even his closest friends in town.

When he visited Carlosruizite in the otherworld desert, he didn't even ask to fuse.

He also didn't ask when/whether Carlosruizite wanted to come back to Night Vale...or what was going on with the University of What It Is...or why Carlosruizite was steering him away from talking to the oddly-familiar toothy figure who had never been mentioned in any of their calls. He didn't have the stamina to ask for much of anything. (Especially knowing that Carlosruizite has a pattern of promising the thing and then going back on the promise.)

Back in Night Vale, most people shapeshifted into their sharpest forms and flashiest outfits for the arrival of Fashion Week. Moonstone just went with the last body/outfit he'd regenerated into. Didn't even bother to adjust the fact that his arms were different sizes. Didn't care at all what might happen to him.

He got poofed by the Sphere, and couldn't summon the will to regenerate.

Janice keeps the Moonstone in her room, in a box with a handmade nest of blankets. She leaves her uncle's favorite food on the table next to him, reads to him when she's at home, and plays old Western movies on a loop when she goes out. She hopes he'll come back soon.

But nobody makes her any promises.


	7. Five Things That Didn't Happen On Fashion Week (T)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If you're here via a subscription notification, please [check the table of contents](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5531141/navigate) for the chapter from the relevant AU!
> 
> \---
> 
> Five Things That Didn't Happen To Cecil On Fashion Week...was the plan, and then I didn't have the stamina to write all five.
> 
> Warnings: canon-typical depression and suicidal ideation; character death.

**One**

(Cecil is already out of town. Carlos actually searched for a Night-Vale-to-otherworld travel route when he said he would, found one early on, was upfront about wanting to do research there. He and Cecil made regular weekend visits over the year, he didn't try to prevent Cecil from talking to Kevin or investigating Kevin's radio station...long story short, Cecil was invited to move several months earlier than in canon, and felt good about it, and said yes. He offers some pointers for Janice's Fashion Week outfit over Skype, to make sure that she's as safe as he is.)

 

**Two**

(Cecil is still in town, but Carlos came over to help him pack for the move. When Cecil has a hard time mustering the energy to pick out an outfit that will keep him from being killed, Carlos does that for him, too. Bonus: Dana told Cecil as soon as she came up with the "handcuff you to something, so you can never be Lot-37-controlled into running off and joining a fight" idea, so he's been doing that for months. Carlos does various things to prove he can be trusted with the key.)

 

**Three**

(Cecil is in town, Carlos isn't, most of the episode happens as in canon. Until Carlos phones/astral-projects in during the Weather, and provides, you know, _any kind of comfort and support_ for his boyfriend's _suicidal depression_.)

(Still not over it.)

 

 

**Four**

The drive to the clinic is quiet. Eerily normal in every other respect, but much too quiet.

Abby puts on the radio, some schmoopy forecast from the '50s; it doesn't drown out the pounding in her chest.

She is a competent, well-adjusted adult (she reminds herself). A capable mother, with, when she needs it, the support of a loving and dedicated husband. Her life is not going to fall apart if Cecil does; she is no longer that scared fourth-grader whose own mother had just disappeared and who desperately needed her big brother to hold it together.

At least Cecil isn't so catatonic that he has to be carried. He follows her into the lobby, subdued and obedient. To a casual observer, he would look like a model citizen.

One of the attendants, reassuringly professional in a bird mask and fireproof gloves, takes their thumbprints to sign them in. Another asks to examine the duffel bag over Abby's shoulder. "I packed it myself," she says. "Nothing sharp, nothing knottable, nothing cursed."

"Nevertheless," says the attendant, polite but firm. "If there's anything we have to remove, you can take it with you when you go."

Cecil's intake interview is full of shrugs and mumbles and noncommittal answers. How is he feeling? Fine, whatever. Has he been unhappy a lot recently? Sure. Does he want to be an inpatient? Eh. Has he been directed here by a government-authorized agent of force? No, just his sister.

"I called this morning and asked what he was going to wear today," says Abby, when the clinician asks. Deep breaths. She is an adult. She can handle this. "He said he was just going to work in the clothes he slept in. I — I thought it was a joke, at first, but he hasn't joked like that in months — and then I thought he was going for some kind of varsity-level hipster strategy, proving himself so far ahead of the fashion curve that he could afford to completely disregard it — except Cecil doesn't _do_ that. Even when he's not being judged by a murderous Sphere, he likes...." No, that's not right. Deep breaths. "He _liked_ putting together a nice outfit. Liked to look good."

The interviewer nods a lot, then turns to Cecil. "Are these the same clothes you're wearing now?"

"No."

"Because this ensemble looks very stylish. I like the tassels."

Cecil shrugs. "Abby put it together."

The interviewer takes this in with big dewey eyes. "Can you tell me why she did that?"

After a long pause, Cecil says, expressionless, "Because she doesn't want me to die."

They're teetering on the brink of the question that scares Abby the most, the one she doesn't want to ask. She presses her eyelids shut and tries to remember how to be strong as the words drop into the room, soft and gentle and with the force of a bomb: "Do _you_ want to die, Mr. Palmer?"

"I don't...." begins Cecil, but it's not a denial, it's the opening of some other thought that fades away mid-word. "It doesn't matter. What I want. If I die, I die. If I don't, I don't. Whatever happens to me is going to happen, no matter what I want. So why bother?"

This, from the Cecil who committed to working a full-time job before he'd finished high school, throwing himself into both tasks with the intensity of a forest fire. From the Cecil who already had his own apartment completely baby-proofed by the time Abby was ready to take her infant and run from her first marriage. The Cecil who spent a year coordinating secret and not-so-secret messages, on behalf of anti-corporate-terrorism revolutionaries. The Cecil who threw himself into the depths of a sinister otherdimensional phenomenon in order to drag that boyfriend of his to safety.

Abby doesn't know when her brother lost all confidence in his own strength...but _she_ is strong, and she is an adult, and she is starting to cry but she's still breathing, and she _got_ him. That's what she has to focus on. She called this morning, she figured out that he was in trouble, and she got to him before the Sphere had a chance to.

"Abby, don't cry. It's okay," says Cecil, in a hollow parody of reassurance. It's detached — emotionless — the only meaning underneath it is _it's okay because even if I got devoured, it wouldn't matter. Don't cry for me because I don't matter._

This is nothing the center hasn't seen before, the interviewer says, in a way that clearly passes right through Cecil but gives Abby the most hope she's had all morning. And his insurance will cover all of it. And (this is the point where Abby thinks Cecil should feel some relief, if he's going to at all, but if there's any change her tear-blurred vision doesn't pick it up) they have plenty of resources to keep his mysterious controller from forcing him to leave the grounds.

Cecil gets an ID bracelet, a set of clean white clothes to change into ("after the Sphere passes by here, of course"), and the bag Abby packed for him, all searched and approved. Abby gets a printout of visiting hours, a pamphlet of helpful bloodstone chants for situations like these, and a referral to a support group for patients' family, friends, symbiotes, and/or loved ones.

"Is there anything you want me to do before I visit tomorrow?" she asks, dragging out the goodbye hug as long as possible. "I'll stop your mail. And I've already let the station know. they need a substitute." She's...reluctant...to bring up Cecil's boyfriend, but she knows the effort Cecil has made to get over his own reluctance about Steve, so she swallows and adds, "Should I call Carlos?"

There's a pause while her brother ponders this. Eventually he shrugs. "You could tell him I won't be able to answer my phone for a while, so he doesn't have to call. Except that if he wants to call, he'll call, whether I'm answering or not. So don't worry about it."

A long and multi-layered reply to this forms in the back of Abby's head.

"I love you," she says, because that's the important part.

She will be strong enough for both of them, _and_ she will care about Cecil enough for both of them, until he can do it for himself again.

 

 

**Five**

"To the family and friends of Voice Cecil...."

Abby gets called into her manager's office after the Weather, just in time to hear a station intern stuttering through NVCR's standard memorial.

Funeral proceedings in Night Vale are very efficient.

She has to box up all his possessions. In spite of all his talk about moving out of town, nothing in his apartment is packed. Half of these things are probably Carlos's, but Cecil's phone got eaten too and nobody else has his phone number, so they can't call and ask him for his input.

Abby beats herself up a lot about not calling Cecil more. About knowing he was having a hard time and not checking in. Even on a dangerous morning like when the Sphere was in town.

Elsewhere, Dana has Hiram and the Faceless Old Woman arrested, and beats herself up a lot about not implementing her "tie Cecil down to something so he can't be used to save me" plan weeks ago. Or months ago. Seriously what was she waiting for?

The family is still grieving on the night of the opera premiere, but Steve coerces Abby and Janice to come with him anyway. Cecil would have wanted them to support Josie's big production, he says.

The show runs without a hitch. A tall glowing entity that is definitely not an angel reads a very touching dedication before the curtain goes up.

Afterward, Janice is smiling, almost excited, for the first time since her uncle got devoured.

Carlos shows up at the after-party.

"Tell Cecil he doesn't have to move!" he says. "I know I already said he didn't _have_ to, when I first asked, but what I mean this time is, he _won't_ move. I already said my goodbyes in the otherworld and everything. Because I realized he would be happier here, with all his friends and family."

A gobsmacked Abby finally asks, "If you were so worried about Cecil's happiness, why did you decide to come back _tonight_ , and not two weeks ago?"

"I decided to come back tonight because of...very scientific circumstances which I do not have time to explain right now," says Carlos firmly. "Why? What happened two weeks ago?"


End file.
